356 Recenthj published Ornithological Works. [Ibis, 



the Cheer confined to the Himalaya, Phasianus the true 

 Pheasants, and Syrmaticus the Long-tailed Pheasants. So far 

 as the first two of these genera are concerned there is no 

 im])ortant change in the nsually accepted taxonomy. 

 As regards Phasianus Mr. Beebe considers that the genus 

 should be restricted to two species only, P. colchicus and 

 its numerous subspecies, and P. versicolor of Japan. 

 Of P. colchicus he admits twenty-three subspecies as 

 against flartert's thirty, ranging from the shores of the 

 Black Sea to Manchuria and Formosa, and he draws 

 attention to the way in which these forms all grade into 

 one another, so that mutation appears to have played but 

 little part in their origin. There can be no doubt that the 

 true Pheasants are a plastic group easily modified by their 

 surroundings, and that they are also individually plastic, 

 so that, even as Mr. Beebe remarks, within the space of two 

 rice-fieids of moderate size it is possible to shoot in a single 

 morning three or four Pheasants which would, if obtained 

 in distinct localities, have been considered distinct races. 

 The last genus, Syrmaticus, has hitherto been restricted to 

 Reeves' Pheasant; Mr. Beebe has withdrawn Soemmerring's 

 trom Phasianus, and Elliot's, Mrs. Hume's, and the Mikado 

 from Calophasis and placed them all togetlier in this genus. 

 He finds, notwithstanding the diversity of the plumage of 

 the males, that they agree in a number of points, especially 

 in the elongated central rectrices and the absence of 

 the disintegrated rump-feathers so characteristic of true 

 Pheasants ; while the females have a good many similar 

 characters, and show undoubted signs of a common origin. 

 This rearrangement seems very satisfactory, and will 

 probably be accepted by future writers. 



It is, however, in the observations which Mr. Beebe was 

 able to make himself during his memorable journey through 

 Asia that tiie greatest interest will be taken. Under the 

 caption " The Bird in its Haunts/' he lets himself go in 

 vivid word-pictures of the various homes of wild pheasants — 

 the paddy-fields and reed-beds of central China, the 

 flowery gorges of the Yangtse, the deodar forests of the 



